The Tomb: A Daria Adventure Story
by peetz5050
Summary: This is an idea that popped into my head and I decided to give it a try, it's a Daria/Tomb Raider crossover . I'm only going to continue this if people think I should so please voice your opinion. Daria and all recognizable characters are the creation of Glenn Eichler and the intellectual property of MTV/Viacom. This is fanfiction, written for fun and no money is being made.


'Amiga! Daria! Can you hear me?'

'Yes Jane, loud and clear.'

'Switch your camera to Night Vision, I can't see a thing on the monitor.'

Daria reached up to her temple and pressed a switch on her helmet.

'That doesn't help much.' Jane complained.

'That's because it's just a stone corridor, give me a minute to sort out the gear and I'll turn the light on.'

From her perch in the cavity over the barred door Daria hauled on the rope attached to her backpack. She wiggled it through the gap and lowered it to the floor on the inside, then followed it. Wedging herself between the two sides of the corridor she took the self inflating balloon out of her pocket, placed it in the aperture and pulled the tab. Once she was satisfied that there were no gaps she turned on the light attached to the front of her helmet.

'There, is that better?'

'It would be if you turned off Night Vision.'

'Yeah, yeah, you're never satisfied, how's that?'

'Better, but I still can't see much, just a lot of stones.'

'Well that's all there is here. Now... I need my lodestone and string... let's hope this works.'

'Yeah, this is definitely not how I wanted to spend Christmas, freezing my little assets off in a caravan in the middle of nowhere! Somewhere there's a hot whiskey with my name on it.'

'Yes, well, if this goes smoothly I'll join you... meanwhile... let's see if that old bugger knew what he was talking about.' Daria answered, thinking of the camp madman sitting beside a roaring fire in his rooms in Oxford resplendent in a silk smoking jacket and a Donald Duck bow tie.

She let the lodestone fall to the length of the string and walked slowly down the corridor. Her gear was made entirely of non-ferrous materials, some of it, including the automatics strapped to her hips, had to be made specially. _"Nothing made of iron will pass through the portal, even the iron in your blood will cause you intense pain as you go through."_

After several steps the lodestone shot out to the right. That was the first stone. She stepped forward, the lodestone dropped, forward again, there it was, the second stone, just as Willoughby had promised. The one in between therefore, was the gateway.

'Are you sure about this Daria? The Irish are gonna go ballistic when they find out you're desecrating a national monument.'

'They will... but if I find what I think I'm going to find down there this is gonna make Sutton Hoo look like a toy box by comparison, we're talking about King Tut levels of treasure.'

'Let's face it Daria, you don't need the money... after your Dad's cousin left you all that money and three houses, sorry, stately homes in England!'

'I told you Jane, it's not the money. I showed you the letter that was with the will.'

'Yeah, she wrote "Find Me", I mean she's been declared dead for three years now all you're gonna find is a pile of bones.'

'Well then I'll find a pile of bones and bring it home to bury it beside her father... but I don't think she's dead.'

'I still don't see how you can say that, you're always the logical one, "Prove IT" is your motto and here you are getting all metaphysical on me, you spent too much time with Timmy O'Neill in your youth!'

'Thanks for that pleasant memory Jane, your Christmas present is in the box behind you, don't mind that it's counting down I mean ticking.'

'Har, Har.'

'But seriously Jane, you saw that thing in Cairo, that wasn't human. I have to find this cup to pay it, then I may find out what happened to Lara.'

'What if she wants her money back?'

'Well she can have it. I never even met the woman and she goes and leaves me millions! Why? I mean why me? I'm just a librarian.'

'And she was just an archaeologist but look what she got up to, look what you've already got up to! Never thought I'd see you with a pair of pistols strapped on burglarizing a Neolithic tomb!'

'I'm not a burglar, this is a scientific expedition.'

'Following the trail left behind by a lunatic and his Gay-As-Christmas grandson!'

'And right every step of the way so far.'

'Except he believed it was under Stonehenge, not here.'

'Yes... what did you think of that landlady, Big Regan? She was very helpful but seemed a bit too keen, you know what I mean? Like she already knew why we were here. I was... a little concerned about the way she was so quick to find a couple of American women here for the Solstice who'd take a bribe to let us take their places, they'd been waiting years! But they just did what she told them.'

'Yeah, she kinda scares me too. Did you notice all the locals treat her like she was royalty or something? They were all scared too.'

'Yeah... anyhow, let's give this a try.' She took her pack of titanium alloy tools and selected a crowbar. It took her a few minutes but then she found the pivot point and one of the huge stone monoliths that lined the corridor swung outwards. 'Not too much damage, thank God!'

Tentatively she put her hand through the gap and snatched it back hurriedly with a cry. That HURT! She took off her camera and put it on a little extendable rod. 'OK Jane, you get to be my eyes for the moment. Can you see down the shaft?'

'Only a few feet.'

'OK, get ready with a stopwatch, I'm going to drop a flare.'

'Ready.'

Daria took a luminescent flare from her back pack, cracked it, then , holding the camera steadily pointing down the shaft she tossed it in. In her earpiece she heard Jane counting 'One, two, three...' After a while Jane said. 'That's it, it's gone out of sight and it was still falling... Daria... that was a hell of a long way... have you...?'

'Yeah, I have plenty of rope and pitons. I'm going to set up a repeater at the top of the shaft so we can keep in touch, OK?.'

'Amiga... Daria... be careful... please... I'm too old to be breaking in a new friend.'

'Hey! Don't get all mushy on me, I'll be fine, after the Sphinx this'll be a piece of cake... wish me luck, this is gonna hurt like a sonofabitch!'

'Luck!'

The pain was excruciating! Daria was really glad she'd attached a belaying rope to the stone in the corridor as she would have had no chance of holding herself from falling into the shaft through the agony. She hammered a piton into a crack in the stone and attached a second safety rope. 'Well... that was interesting... OK, I'm about to start my descent. Are you recording?'

'Yep.'

'Well then, for the record this is Daria Morgendorffer also holder of the title of Lady Croft through a bequest. It is 3:22 on the morning of December 25th. 2012. I am in the corridor leading to the burial chamber in the Neolothic tomb at Newgrange, County Meath in Ireland. I am about to descend a previously undiscovered shaft leading to... well nobody knows what it leads to, but I'm about to find out.'

TBC?


End file.
